The Story of Our Stories

A regional community-engaged research report

From March 2019 to October 2020, Thinking Rock Community Arts visited with 30 community-engaged artists working in the rural, remote and First Nation contexts across Northern Ontario to hear their stories and learn from their lived experiences about the challenges and opportunities they are facing in delivering community-engaged arts programming in their communities, and to consider what supports, research, and/or policy actions might help make their work easier and more sustainable. 

Using this document as a starting point, we are now hoping to tell the “Story of Our Stories” to as wide a range of community stakeholders as possible who hold decision making power in this region. This includes: local funders; economic development groups; city planners; municipal staff and elected officials; Chief and Councils; policy experts; business owners; Indigenous community and cultural organizations; social service agencies; health centres and hospitals; educational institutions; MPs and MPPs; federal and provincial ministries; cultural policy makers and influencers; arts and non-arts funders; and other artists and cultural organizations.

The intention behind sharing this story with such a wide breadth of cross-sector actors is to educate and inform each of these groups about the myriad economic, social and cultural impacts that community-engaged artists, organizations and projects are having every day in their communities. More importantly, it is to inspire each of them to examine how they might use their own power and influence to support this important work and dismantle some of the endemic challenges that are standing in the way of its achieving its full potential for making their communities healthier, more creative, more connected, more equitable and more resilient places to live, work and play.

Miigwetch, Merci, Thank You to all of the amazing artists who contributed their voices to this story!